Hardware & Technical Single good or Triple cheap?

[Steve50]

I've decided that until the prices come down, a Rift is out of my comfort zone, ie I can't justify spending £250 on it right now. So I wait until its cheaper.

Sadly my monitor is dying (I got it free with a PC almost 5 years ago, so its done me well) and I need to buy a new monitor but I have a choice. My budget is £150-200 MAX and I've been toying with this..

Do I buy one good quality monitor (£120-150) or do I buy three really cheap monitors so I can play ED on three screens? (3x £60)

What would be best do you think? (and no.. 3 good quality ones are way out of my budget)

 

[Gorodd]

I would suggest going with a single monitor and getting the ED head tracker - I use the IR5 head tracking device but a friend of mine bought the ED head tracker for about a 10th of the price and uses it too good effect!

 

[Steve50]

I would suggest going with a single monitor and getting the ED head tracker - I use the IR5 head tracking device but a friend of mine bought the ED head tracker for about a 10th of the price and uses it too good effect!

okay, what I'm going to say right now might be insanely stupid but I've never used a head tracker nor seen one, so please don't laugh too much..

How does it work? surely if I turn my head then I will be looking at the wall or window rather than my monitor?

 

[Splette]

I'd buy one good monitor instead of three cheap ones.
I used an average priced monitor before but spent some money on a nice EIZO two years ago. I don't want to go back, it really makes a difference.
Sure, the effect and immersion of a 3-monitor setup would be nice, too but too much of a compromise if you are on a budget already.

As for head tracking, there are different options. TrackIR works with infraread. You have a clip on your headset and an IR receiver on the top of your monitor. The EDtracker (which I bought and is way cheaper) works without IR, so you just stick it on your headset. The way all those devices work is that when you tilt your head by let's say 10°, the tilt of the view on screen will be multiplied with a factor, that you can define. So, it's not a 1:1 translation of your head movement. It's more like you turn your head a little bit and the view on the monitor turns by more.
It works just like the mouse: The distance the mouse in your hand travels on the desk is way smaller than the distance that the mouse cursor travels on a (large) screen. Still it feels perfectly natural.

 

[Steve50]

Thanks

a headtracker sounds cool, just checked the TrackIR prices and ouch! that's expensive, I'll check EDtracker now, thanks.

 

[rivius]

One good, big enough monitor of course. It's good for everything, not for ED only. And most important is good for your eyes in the first place. And it stays usable much longer than many other components.

Also can confirm - head tracker is very handy and useful, though not absolutely necessary. I use TrackIR 5 and had to play with response curves for a while (this is really important step). But once it's tuned, it's good.

 

[Morgo_the_MonkeyGod]

Doesn't fit within your budget, but I recently picked up an Asus 29' Ultrawide. Coupled with head tracking (TiR (?)) it's great. There other more affordable ultrawides but be careful that they are 1080.